Last year me, my brother and my cousin cooked Christmas Dinner for the family. It went down pretty well so we were allowed to do it again this year. We took the safe option last year though, so we thought we'd mix it up a little bit this time around. We kept it traditional, but added some interesting twists.
The main centrepiece was a multi-bird roast - a grouse inside a poulette inside a chicken inside a duck inside a turkey. It was pretty gruesome work preparing it, but the end result was unbelieveably tasty.
This was the starting point for the multi-bird roast, all bought from Borough Market a couple of days beforehand.
First step was to fully debone the birds since we're wrapping them inside each other. I left the bones in the legs and wings of the turkey so it held some of its shape.
The leftover bones. Gruesome, although they made an amazing stock to use in the gravy - even my vegetarian brother tried it!
Next, we stacked the deboned birds up biggest to smallest with a layer of stuffing in between. Yeah, I know - right now this doesn't look much better than the piles of bones.
Finally, wrap it all up and sew the skin together on the turkey. I.. I'm still not sure I really want to eat this.
However, after adding a bacon lattice and cooking for about 7 hours it suddenly looks pretty appetising. Fortunately it also tasted pretty amazing so it was worth all the effort.
Not to be outdone, Cousin Matt also cooked a joint of beef to perfection.
Here's the model I based the cake on. It's a Mercedes Sprinter in case you were wondering. And no, I'm not an ambulance nerd - I had to look it up :-).
I like to draw my cakes before I start baking so I know what I'm trying to make (even if the drawings are a bit "industrial"). It sort of helps me to keep it in check if it starts going a bit weird half-way through.
To make the gingerbread, gently heat an unholy concotion of brown sugar, butter and cream. Stir until fully melted and combined.
Mix the dry ingredients - plain flour, baking powder and some ground ginger, then mix it into the treacle. I like to add a bit extra ginger so it has a little kick to it. Once it's all combined you have to work quickly as it will slowly harden as it cools.
Roll the mixture out into sheets about 5mm thick, cut them to shape and then bake them until they just start to darken around the edges. I'd made some templates for the individual parts so I cut them to shape before I put them in the oven. However, they spread slightly as they cook so I trimmed them up again when they came out. Again - work quickly because they harden very quickly as they cool down and you'll end up cracking the pieces if you're not careful.
Once the pieces have cooled, glue them together with a thick icing. I had to trim a couple of pieces down more so they all fitted together properly.
I made a chocolate sponge cake to mount the ambulance on, which also meant it would go further.
